Recurring Characters

Marco Pacella: Theory room tech and friend of Diana’s. He wrote the paper that got Tom reassigned to active duty. — season two production notes.

“I just opened a 401K. Yeah, I’m pretty sure the government stops matching donations once you commit treason.”

Richard Kahan brought a box of corn pops to his audition. “There were many, many people trying out, and I just wanted to bring the right idea to the table,” he says with a grin. “So there I was, snacking on the corn pops while I was interacting with the other characters in the scene. In my mind, that’s part of who Marco is. He’s a multi-tasker. He’s always got so much stuff on his plate that he’s just go, go, go! Marco doesn’t have time to sit down and eat scrambled eggs.”

It was a great intuitive choice. “I immediately glommed onto Richard’s performance in his audition tape,” says Ira Behr. “He came on like Quentin Tarantino, so passionate about some subject matter that he’s lecturing you, and there’s no room for argument – which doesn’t matter because he’s giving a performance you want to listen to. Richard had that same quality. He came off like he was a hell of a lot smarter than you, and that he could make connections you could never see, but you’d be a fool not to listen to him.”

“That’s my favourite thing about Marco,” Kahan admits. “He’s constantly coming up with the big discovery. And that makes Tom and Diana want to turn to him more, because they know they can always count on Marco. I refer to him as the ‘quirky sidekick’.”

Jacqueline McKenzie appreciates Marco as much as Diana. “He’s not some enter-stage-right spunky dude with a six pack of abs,” she says. “Oh, that would be boring, boring!”

Diana’s personal relationship with Marco grew during season two, culminating with a romantic kiss in ‘Mommy’s Bosses’. “On one level, Marco and Diana is a strange pairing,” Kahan admits, “but on another it really makes sense. They’re two peas in the same pod, because of their backgrounds. So it was fun for me to play the guy who gets the girl – or at least pursues her, even if they did cut a lot of our scenes together!”

“That was our fault,” admits Behr. “The scenes were always being cut for time. We eventually had to break them up and I actually felt bad for Marco.” However, Behr admits that he’s already thinking of ways to make it up to him in a coming season.

Throughout ‘Carrier’, Marco looks for opportunities to get closer to Diana. “One of the great things about Diana is that she’s so focused and involved in her work,” says Richard Kahan. “Well, Marco can see that, and he can take it as an opportunity to come in with a fresh cup of coffee for her.” Near the end of the episode, he ups the ante by supplying her with a fake version of Maia’s diary. “That was such a great moment for my character,” Kahan says. “Up to this point you know that Marco loves his job, and that he’s like a kid in a candy store when it comes to research. But now you see that he cares so much about Diana that he puts his job on the line to help her out. It’s just a great step in rounding out Marco and showing who he is deep down inside.

“For me, that challenge of that diary scene was playing his anticipation of what her reaction would be,” Kahan continues. “He knows that he’s really putting himself out there revealing what he’s feeling for her. But when Diana is so taken aback and appreciative, it seemed natural for Marco to shy away and not fully take credit for what he did.

“When we were shooting that scene, there was a very clear reaction of “Awwwwwww,” from the females on the set,” Kahan laughs. “It was really fun to play. It’s one of my favourite scenes.”

• “There’s a scene in ‘Wake-Up Call’ with Tom and Diana and Marco standing outside in the rain looking at the tower,” Richard Kahan says. “While we were shooting, it was raining outside, and Marco was te only one with an umbrella and not roughing it. Everyone else was working in the muck. Well, at one point in the scene, Marco is holding the umbrella just over himself, and Tom gives Marco a dirty look, grabs the umbrella and pulls it over so they’re all sharing it. That move wasn’t scripted or rehearsed. It was completely Joel Gretsch’s idea.”

• “I always have a couple of days worth of stubble when I’m playing Marco, because he’s the kind of guy that you feel you’re catching during his day off from shaving,” RIchard Kahan says. “It’s strange, because on the one hand, Marco’s not gonna be putting gel in his hair in the morning; he just doesn’t have time to be concerned with stuff like that. And yet, on the other hand, he wears geek chic at it’s finest, probably because we have the best wardrobe people on this show.”But Marco has some style sense, and that’s visible in the way he dresses in layers. He has shirts over shirts over shirts, and a blazer with letters and things sticking out of the pockets. But those blazers are great. I looked at one of the labels and it said ‘Dolce & Gabbana’, and I remember thinking, ‘Wow, Marco must be doing better than I am!’ Although I’m not going to lie, there’s some elements of that in my personal wardrobe too, so I think it’s great.”

  Marco is young, but he’s got a good paying government job, and he gets a company car. He doesn’t have time to spend his money aside from sci-fi festivals and such, so I think he spends it on his wardrobe. And he wears fashionable, yet oversized glasses. So when you get into some of those duds, putting on those glasses really seals the deal. That’s the key to who he is.

• (In Hidden) Two more pairings provided unexpected bonding moments. One gave Marco the opportunity to comfort Diana in a parking lot. “Marco was worried for Diana’s safety,” Richard Kahan says. “He was trying to tell her as a colleague that she should listen to Maia, and he was trying to tell her as a friend that he was concerned for her. The quiet strength of that scene is a tribute to Chris Misiano, who’s directed many of our shows. It’s still one of my favourite scenes. Plus, I got to hug Jacqui, which is always fun.

• “The theory room isn’t a very big set, so there aren’t a lot of camera angles or different shots that can physically happen in there,” Richard Kahan comments. “A big part of shooting in the theory room is that everyone has had their time to be in front of the projector. There’s a screen in the back of the room that’s constantly showing projected images, like maps or the work that Marco and his team are working on. And we’ve found that we each have had a turn at standing in front of that screen and having the eerie light of the projector shine on our faces as we act. Every new director tries to find new ways to shoot in there, which is always interesting, but essentially, we’ve done many similar-looking scenes.”

• (In Lockdown) “And speaking of madmen, Richard Kahan was delighted to protray “Mad Marco”, as the cast referred to him. “It’s fun to play the other side of a character,” the actor says. “Raising his voice to Diana and the guys in the theory room was way out of character, even though Marco didn’t get nearly as aggressive as the other NTAC guys. The signal that T.J. Kim sends out seemed to focus directly on men’s testosterone levels, so I guess the implication was that Marco is more ‘sensitive’ than the others,” Kahan conjectures. “That allowed him to maintain his composure enough to help Diana out. It says a lot about Marco.”

• Which brings us to Diana’s relationship with Marco Pacella, the man who most often bends the rules for her. Diana probably hasn’t given a lot of thought to what’s behind her attraction, but McKenzie obviously has. “He’s this bright fantastic dude whose mind totally rings Diana’s bell,” McKenzie rhapsodizes. “They have similar likes and fascinations. And she has this trust in him, quite an intimate trust, which she doesn’t seem to have in anyone else. Diana will defer to Tom in police matters most of the time. But I think with Marco she’d defer at any time, particularly in personal matters. She feels safe with him and respects him.”

- The 4400 Seasons 1 & 2 companion book, published by Titan Books.